Rail workers fined $10,000 for striking

[Hiero]

More than 90 Perth construction workers have been fined up to $10,000 for taking part in an illegal strike and the federal government can do nothing about it, ACTU secretary Sharan Burrow says.

Against the advice of the Construction, Forestry, Mining and Energy Union (CFMEU), 400 workers walked off the Perth to Mandurah rail project between February 24 and March 3 last year, in protest at the sacking of shop steward Peter Ballard.

Under the Howard government's controversial Work Choices laws, strikes are banned and although the new Labor government plans to turn those laws around, they now stand.

Full Story (http://au.news.yahoo.com/071220/2/15bzs.html)

[Bilan]

PWAH!
This is bollocks!

[bolshevik butcher]

Has there been any serious attempts to organise against these fines by the Austrialian labour and trade union movement? Clearly these represent a huge blow against militancy in work places....

[cary jebus]

O.o tohse people are insane.

[Hiero]

Originally posted by bolshevik [email protected] 21, 2007 10:52 am
Has there been any serious attempts to organise against these fines by the Austrialian labour and trade union movement? Clearly these represent a huge blow against militancy in work places....
Well the CFMEU will pay for the fines. I guess the current trade union movement goal now is to presurre the Labour government to follow through with their promise to remove Howards anti-union work place laws.

[RNK]

A similar thing happened here in Montreal a couple of years ago. City workers went on a, *ahem*, "illegal strike" and marched through downtown streets to the municipal offices. Although no action was taken by the municipality, everyday citizens who were, *ahem*, "inconvenienced" by the march launched a class-action lawsuit against the workers' union on the order of over $10,000,000. They won, although the judge "graciously" lowered the amount to about $1,000,000.


Makes me sick to be a human being.

[Lynx]

In Canada, strikes are sometimes broken by 'back to work' legislation, which normally mandates binding arbitration to settle the dispute behind closed doors.

[al8]

Is it to hard to ignore these ludicrous fines? Why isn't it done?

[Hiero]

Originally posted by [email protected] 23, 2007 01:13 pm
Is it to hard to ignore these ludicrous fines? Why isn't it done?
Do you mean not pay them?

They will go to jail if the don't. It is the whole point, they are trying to scare workers from striking by fear of bankruptcy of jail.